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Feb. 11th, 2018 09:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsToday I went to go see a stage version of Shakespeare in Love, which was not a thing I was aware existed until it came to our city. I enjoyed it very much! In fact I apparently enjoyed it so visibly much that when it ended the dude next to me, who had also been enjoying it very much -- and with whom I had exchanged no words, but several delighted glances -- turned to me and politely thanked me for being a great theater companion. You're very welcome, stranger in the front row! You also were a great theater companion!
The show's scene-stealer was definitely Christopher Marlowe, who got five times as much stage time as he did in the original film in order to be 200% more sparkly and 300% more gay, and I loved every second of it. The casting was amazing -- the actor even looks quite a lot like Marlowe's portrait -- and obviously I am Very Much Here for Marlowe's TWO VESTS and GOLD LAME and SHINY SHOES.
I am also here for Marlowe as Shakespeare's Mercutio, which is not a thing I really remember the film doing but which is a DANG GOOD IDEA and which the show highlights by having Marlowe turns up during the Shakespeare-Viola balcony scene and long-sufferingly Cyrano de Bergerac him through a first draft of "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" Normally I'm not a fan of "Marlowe wrote Shakespeare's best lines!" but in this case it got me Shakespeare demanding that Marlowe boost him up to Viola's balcony while Marlowe made "REALLY, HETEROSEXUALS?" faces at the audience, so I'm OK with it.
On the flip side, it did make me about 400% sadder when Marlowe died, not just because it's more emotionally resonant when you get to see more of Marlowe and Shakespeare being actual friends, but also because I thought it meant Marlowe was not going to unexpectedly turn up and steal any more scenes. Fortunately, I was wrong! In fact the last scene in this version of the story is The Ghost of Marlowe appearing to help Shakespeare with his new play and be sarcastic about the impossibility of Viola confessing her love to Orsino while disguised as a boy. Thank you, theatrical adapters, for understanding what was important to me in this version of the show.
Richard Burbage also got a significantly expanded role from the film and was extremely good -- I don't remember if Burbage and Ned Alleyn got to have a swordfight over the Romeo script in the movie, so even if they did it probably wasn't very memorable, whereas the Burbage-Alleyn swordfight in the theatrical version was COMEDY GOLD, as was Burbage striding bombastically to the rescue at the end with his available playhouse. (Did I come out of the show shipping Burbage/Alleyn? PERHAPS.) John Webster got a bit more to do as well, and I appreciated that they styled him like a character out of Alex Cox's version of The Revenger's Tragedy, which I like to think of as a Jacobean Tragedy in-joke just for me even though it was probably just coincidence.
Honestly, all the Elizabethan stage shenanigans held up as well or better against the movie. The romance, not so much. Shakespeare was perfectly fine, but didn't have the pitch-perfect hilarious intensity of Joseph Fiennes. I didn't love Stage Viola, but I'm willing to blame part of the stiffness of her performance on the enormous Christine Daae wig that she got saddled with when she was Being Female; she definitely seemed more comfortable as Thomas Kent.
My biggest complaint about the theatrical version is how they ramp up The Odious Evil of Wessex. The show adds several moments where he's very explicitly sexually menacing towards Viola; when she faints after mistakenly hearing that Shakespeare is dead, it seems like he's about to rape her before Shakespeare conveniently turns up, which feels to me like a wildly unnecessary addition. It also makes a huge problem for the ending -- the film makes the bittersweet end feel appropriate, but in the show, with Wessex so VERY villainous, it honestly does seem like it would be a better choice for Viola to fake her own death and run away than to spend the next few years trapped with Wessex in sixteenth-century Virginia!
That said, it was still definitely worth the price of admission (well ... for me the price was zero dollars, because I ushered, but still) and I would watch a whole sequel play that was just a buddy comedy about Shakespeare and the Long-Suffering, Sparkly Ghost of Christopher Marlowe.
The show's scene-stealer was definitely Christopher Marlowe, who got five times as much stage time as he did in the original film in order to be 200% more sparkly and 300% more gay, and I loved every second of it. The casting was amazing -- the actor even looks quite a lot like Marlowe's portrait -- and obviously I am Very Much Here for Marlowe's TWO VESTS and GOLD LAME and SHINY SHOES.
I am also here for Marlowe as Shakespeare's Mercutio, which is not a thing I really remember the film doing but which is a DANG GOOD IDEA and which the show highlights by having Marlowe turns up during the Shakespeare-Viola balcony scene and long-sufferingly Cyrano de Bergerac him through a first draft of "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" Normally I'm not a fan of "Marlowe wrote Shakespeare's best lines!" but in this case it got me Shakespeare demanding that Marlowe boost him up to Viola's balcony while Marlowe made "REALLY, HETEROSEXUALS?" faces at the audience, so I'm OK with it.
On the flip side, it did make me about 400% sadder when Marlowe died, not just because it's more emotionally resonant when you get to see more of Marlowe and Shakespeare being actual friends, but also because I thought it meant Marlowe was not going to unexpectedly turn up and steal any more scenes. Fortunately, I was wrong! In fact the last scene in this version of the story is The Ghost of Marlowe appearing to help Shakespeare with his new play and be sarcastic about the impossibility of Viola confessing her love to Orsino while disguised as a boy. Thank you, theatrical adapters, for understanding what was important to me in this version of the show.
Richard Burbage also got a significantly expanded role from the film and was extremely good -- I don't remember if Burbage and Ned Alleyn got to have a swordfight over the Romeo script in the movie, so even if they did it probably wasn't very memorable, whereas the Burbage-Alleyn swordfight in the theatrical version was COMEDY GOLD, as was Burbage striding bombastically to the rescue at the end with his available playhouse. (Did I come out of the show shipping Burbage/Alleyn? PERHAPS.) John Webster got a bit more to do as well, and I appreciated that they styled him like a character out of Alex Cox's version of The Revenger's Tragedy, which I like to think of as a Jacobean Tragedy in-joke just for me even though it was probably just coincidence.
Honestly, all the Elizabethan stage shenanigans held up as well or better against the movie. The romance, not so much. Shakespeare was perfectly fine, but didn't have the pitch-perfect hilarious intensity of Joseph Fiennes. I didn't love Stage Viola, but I'm willing to blame part of the stiffness of her performance on the enormous Christine Daae wig that she got saddled with when she was Being Female; she definitely seemed more comfortable as Thomas Kent.
My biggest complaint about the theatrical version is how they ramp up The Odious Evil of Wessex. The show adds several moments where he's very explicitly sexually menacing towards Viola; when she faints after mistakenly hearing that Shakespeare is dead, it seems like he's about to rape her before Shakespeare conveniently turns up, which feels to me like a wildly unnecessary addition. It also makes a huge problem for the ending -- the film makes the bittersweet end feel appropriate, but in the show, with Wessex so VERY villainous, it honestly does seem like it would be a better choice for Viola to fake her own death and run away than to spend the next few years trapped with Wessex in sixteenth-century Virginia!
That said, it was still definitely worth the price of admission (well ... for me the price was zero dollars, because I ushered, but still) and I would watch a whole sequel play that was just a buddy comedy about Shakespeare and the Long-Suffering, Sparkly Ghost of Christopher Marlowe.
no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 04:14 am (UTC)I approve, especially since in the original film he was played by Rupert Everett and therefore already pretty damn gay.
the actor even looks quite a lot like Marlowe's portrait
OH GOD DAMN THAT'S THE ASP'S GAVESTON HE IS GREAT AND ALSO VERY GAY. I WOULD HAVE WATCHED HIS MARLOWE. A LOT.
and I appreciated that they styled him like a character out of Alex Cox's version of The Revenger's Tragedy, which I like to think of as a Jacobean Tragedy in-joke just for me even though it was probably just coincidence.
You never know. If you're the kind of person who directs a stage version of Shakespeare in Love, you are probably aware of other Elizabethan/Jacobean films.
The escalation of Wessex-as-Villain rather than just Wessex-as-Dude-Viola-Does-Not-Care-to-Marry does sound like a problem. Otherwise, this sounds delightful and I wish I'd known about it!
no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 04:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 04:35 am (UTC)I would not put it past the actor to own it. He looks great in it.
(I am using that very same production photo as evidence in my post complaining that I had no idea this show was even happening. It is probably my own fault for not reading the arts section in the newspaper more often. But I'm still sorry!)
He really was brilliant, whichever author or director was like "remember that scene at the party/the palace/the tragic end of the film? THAT SCENE WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER WITH MARLOWE IN IT" made an extremely good decision.
I'm glad! Marlowe in the original film was a brilliant cameo, but that's kind of the problem with Marlowe in history, too. Always more Marlowe.
no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 04:51 am (UTC)I enjoyed the Rupert Everett cameo very much, but it honestly never before occurred to me to think "what that movie needed above all things was more Marlowe," so I'm extremely glad that somebody involved in the production was cleverer than me.
no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 05:34 am (UTC)Look, I'm glad someone I knew made it and wrote it up!
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Date: 2018-02-12 04:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 04:33 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-13 03:21 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 05:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 05:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 07:12 am (UTC)I would watch a whole sequel play that was just a buddy comedy about Shakespeare and the Long-Suffering, Sparkly Ghost of Christopher Marlowe.
Holy shit, how is this not a thing already? I would so watch this.
no subject
Date: 2018-02-21 02:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 09:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-21 02:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-12 11:51 am (UTC)This play sounds like it would've tap-danced on my id and made me not care much about the Wessex and Viola bits.
no subject
Date: 2018-02-21 02:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-16 09:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-21 02:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-02-18 03:38 pm (UTC)Also, every time someone tries to make another novel or TV show about how Cool and Sexy and Rebellious William Shakespeare is (TNT's Will, I'm glaring at you), I always think to myself...but have you met Christopher Marlowe? It seriously amazes me that there hasn't been a biopic of him yet.
(...I would cast Daveed Diggs.)
no subject
Date: 2018-02-21 02:50 am (UTC)Has there really never been a Marlowe biopic? There must have been, right? SURELY.
no subject
Date: 2018-02-23 04:05 pm (UTC)There was once a Marlowe musical, though. Apparently. It was inexplicably heterosexual.
https://tempestsarekind.dreamwidth.org/490955.html